1950 – Peter Gabriel is born in Surrey, England. H…

Peter Brian Gabriel (born 13 February 1950) is a Grammy Award-winning English musician and songwriter. He first rose to fame as the lead vocalist and flautist of the progressive rock group Genesis. After leaving Genesis, Gabriel went on to a successful solo career. More recently he has focused on producing and promoting world music and pioneering digital distribution methods for music. He has also been involved in various humanitarian efforts.

Early life

Gabriel was born in Chobham, Surrey, England. from a musical family, taught him to play the clarinet at an early age. He attended Cable House, a private preparatory school in Woking, Surrey, then Charterhouse School from 1963.

Genesis

Main article: Genesis (band)

Gabriel founded Genesis in 1967 with fellow Charterhouse School pupils Tony Banks, Anthony Phillips, Mike Rutherford, and drummer Chris Stewart. The name of the band was suggested by fellow Charterhouse alumnus, the pop music impresario Jonathan King, who produced their first album, From Genesis to Revelation.

A lover of soul music, Gabriel was influenced by many different sources in his way of singing – mainly Otis Redding and other soul singers, as well as Family lead singer Roger Chapman. He also played the flute on Cat Stevens’ Mona Bone Jakon album in 1970.

Genesis drew some attention in England and eventually also in Italy, Belgium, Germany and other European countries, largely due to Gabriel’s flamboyant stage presence, which involved numerous bizarre costume changes and comical, dreamlike stories told as the introduction to each song (originally Gabriel developed these stories solely to cover the time between songs that the rest of the band would take tuning their instruments). The concerts made extensive use of black light with the normal stage lighting subdued or off. A backdrop of fluorescent white sheets and a comparatively sparse stage made the band into a set of silhouettes, with Gabriel’s fluorescent costume and make-up providing the only other sources of light.

Among Gabriel’s many famous costumes (which he developed to visualize the musical ideas of the band, and to get them press coverage) were “Batwings” (for the usual opening number, “Watcher of the Skies”), “The Flower” (worn for “Supper’s Ready”, from Foxtrot), “Magog” (also worn for “Supper’s Ready”, from Foxtrot), “Britannia” (worn for “Dancing with the Moonlit Knight”, from Selling England by the Pound), “The Reverend” (worn for “The Battle of Epping Forest”, also from Selling England by the Pound), “The Old Man” (worn for “The Musical Box”, from Nursery Cryme), “Rael” (the protagonist of the album The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway), and “The Slipperman” (worn during “The Colony of Slippermen”, also from The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway).

Backing vocals in Genesis during Gabriel’s tenure in the band were usually handled by bassist/guitarist Mike Rutherford, keyboardist/guitarist Tony Banks, and (most prominently) drummer Phil Collins, who — after a long search for a replacement — eventually became Genesis’s lead singer, after Gabriel had left the band in 1975.

The departure

Gabriel’s departure from Genesis – which stunned fans of the group and left many commentators wondering if the band could survive – was the result of a number of factors. His stature as the lead singer of the band, and the added attention garnered by his flamboyant stage persona, led to tensions within the band. Genesis had always operated more or less as a collective, and Gabriel’s burgeoning public profile led to fears within the group that he was being unfairly singled out as the creative hub; in addition, the band had begun to feel confined by the reputation (and fans’ expectations) attached to their famously elaborate theatrical performances.

Tensions were heightened by the ambitious album and tour of the concept work The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, a Gabriel-created concept piece which saw him taking on the lion’s share of the lyric writing. During the writing and recording of The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, Gabriel was approached by director William Friedkin, allegedly because Friedkin had found Gabriel’s short story in the liner notes to Genesis Live interesting. Gabriel’s interest in a film project with Friedkin was another contributing factor in his decision to leave Genesis. The decision to quit the band was made before the tour supporting The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, but Gabriel stayed with the band until the conclusion of that tour. Although tensions were high, both Gabriel and the remaining members of Genesis have stated publicly that Gabriel left the band on good terms, supported by the fact that he officially left eight months after telling the band it was time for him to move on.

The breaking point came with the difficult pregnancy of Gabriel’s wife, Jill, and the subsequent birth of their first child, Anna. When he opted to stay with his sick daughter and wife, rather than record and tour, the resentment from the rest of the band led Gabriel to conclude that he had to leave the band. “Solsbury Hill”, Gabriel’s début single as a solo artist, was written specifically about his departure from Genesis.

Solo career

Gabriel refused to title any of his first four solo albums, which were all labelled Peter Gabriel using the same typeface, but which featured different cover art. They are usually differentiated by number in order of release (I, II, III, IV), or by sleeve design, with the first three solo albums often referred to as Car, Scratch and Melt respectively, in reference to their cover artwork. His fourth solo album, also called Peter Gabriel, was titled Security in the U.S. at the behest of Geffen Records.

After acquiescing to distinctive titles, Gabriel used a series of 2-letter words to title his next three albums: So, Us, and Up. His most recent greatest hits compilation is titled Hit; within the two-CD package, disc one is labelled “Hit” and disc two is labelled “Miss”.

Peter Gabriel albums (1977-1985)

Gabriel recorded his first self-titled solo album in 1976 and 1977 with producer Bob Ezrin. His first solo success came with the single “Solsbury Hill”, an autobiographical piece expressing his thoughts on leaving Genesis. In it, he sings, “My friends would think I was a nut…”, alluding to his decision to begin a period of self-exploration and reflection, while he grew cabbages, carrots, parsnips, broccoli and a wide range of other garden vegetables, played the piano for long hours, practised yoga and biofeedback, and spent time with his family. Although mainly happy with the music, Gabriel felt that the album, and especially the track “Here Comes the Flood” was over-produced. Sparser versions can be heard on Robert Fripp’s Exposure, and on Gabriel’s greatest hits compilation Shaking the Tree (1990).

Gabriel worked with guitarist Robert Fripp (of King Crimson fame) as producer of his second solo LP, in 1978. This album was leaner, darker and more experimental, and yielded decent reviews, but no major hits.

Gabriel developed a new interest in world music (especially percussion), and for bold production, which made extensive use of recording tricks and sound effects. Gabriel’s interest in music technology is considered by many people to be the spark of his success as it inspired his 1980 “Peter Gabriel 3: Melt” album. Gabriel’s third album is often (though some would say wrongly) credited as the first LP to use the now-famous “gated drum” sound. Collins played drums on several tracks, including the opener, “Intruder”, which featured the reverse-gated, cymbal-less drum kit sound which Collins would also utilize on his single “In the Air Tonight” and through the rest of the 1980s. Gabriel had requested that his drummers use no cymbals in the album’s sessions, and when he heard the result he asked Collins to play a simple pattern for several minutes, then built “Intruder” on it.

Arduous and occasionally damp recording sessions at his rural English estate in 1981 and 1982, with co-producer/engineer David Lord, resulted in Gabriel’s fourth LP release (Security), on which Gabriel took more production responsibility. It was one of the first commercial albums recorded entirely to digital tape (using a Sony mobile truck), and featured the early, extremely expensive, Fairlight CMI sampling computer, which had already made its first brief appearances on the previous album. Gabriel combined a variety of sampled and deconstructed sounds with world-beat percussion and other unusual instrumentation to create a radically new, emotionally charged soundscape. Furthermore, the sleeve art consisted of inscrutable, video-based imagery. Despite the album’s peculiar sound, odd appearance, and often disturbing themes, it sold very well.

Gabriel toured extensively for each of his albums. Initially, he pointedly eschewed the theatrics that had defined his tenure with Genesis. For his second solo tour, his entire band shaved their heads. But, by the time of Security, he began involving elaborate stage props and acrobatics which had him suspended from gantries, distorting his face with Fresnel lenses and mirrors, and wearing unusual make-up. His 1982–83 tour included a section opening for David Bowie. Recordings of this tour were released as the double LP Plays Live

Peter Gabriel had already achieved critical success with his 1980 “Peter Gabriel 3: Melt” album, which included the songs “Games Without Frontiers”, “I Don’t Remember”, and “Biko”. In 1982, he became even more famous for his fourth album which featured his first Top 40 hit in the U.S., “Shock the Monkey”, as well as the song “I Have the Touch”. The music video for “Shock the Monkey” held the #1 spot on “MTV” for 9 weeks. In America, Geffen records forced Gabriel to call his fourth self-titled album “Security”, to mark his arrival on the label and differentiate his fourth album from the other three.

The stage was set for Gabriel’s critical and commercial breakout with his next studio release, which was in production for almost three years. During the recording and production of the album Gabriel found time to work on the film soundtrack for Alan Parker’s 1984 feature Birdy, which consisted of new material as well as remixed instrumental tracks from his previous studio album.

So, Passion and Us (1986-1994)

Gabriel achieved his greatest popularity with songs from the 1986 So album, which produced three UK Top 20 hits (“Sledgehammer”, “Big Time”, and “Don’t Give Up” – a duet with Kate Bush). The album also produced three Top 40 hits in the U.S. (“Sledgehammer”, “Big Time”, and “In Your Eyes”), as well as the single “Red Rain”. “Sledgehammer”, peaked at no.4 in the UK but was a #1 hit in the U.S., knocking Genesis’ “Invisible Touch” off the top spot. The ballad “Don’t Give Up” was about the devastation of unemployment. Gabriel co-produced So with Daniel Lanois, also known for his work with U2.

Gabriel’s song “Sledgehammer”, which dealt specifically with the themes of sex and sexual relations, was accompanied by a much-lauded music video, which was a collaboration with director Stephen R. Johnson, Aardman Animations, and the Brothers Quay. The video won numerous awards at the 1987 MTV Music Video Awards, and set a new standard for art in the music video industry. A follow-up video for the song “Big Time” also broke new ground in music video animation and special effects. The song is a story of “what happens to you when you become a little too successful”, in Gabriel’s words.

Gabriel played a prominent role in supporting Amnesty International at this time, appearing on the 1986 U.S. A Conspiracy of Hope Tour and on the 1988 worldwide Human Rights Now! Tour.

In 1989, Gabriel released Passion, the soundtrack for Martin Scorsese’s movie The Last Temptation of Christ. For this work he received his first Grammy Award, in the category of Best New Age Performance. He also received a Golden Globe nomination for Best Original Score – Motion Picture.

Following this, Gabriel recorded Us in 1992 (also co-produced with Daniel Lanois), an album in which he explored the pain of recent personal problems; his failed first marriage, his relationship with Rosanna Arquette, and the growing distance between him and his first daughter.

Gabriel’s introspection within the context of the album Us can be seen in the first single release “Digging in the Dirt” directed by John Downer. Accompanied by a disturbing video featuring Gabriel covered in snails and various foliage, this song made reference to the psychotherapy which had taken up much of Gabriel’s time since the previous album. Gabriel describes his struggle to get through to his daughter in “Come Talk To Me” directed by Matt Mahurin, which featured backing vocals by Sinéad O’Connor. O’Connor also lent vocals to “Blood of Eden”, directed by Nichola Bruce and Michael Coulson, the third single to be released from the album, and once again dealing with relationship struggles, this time going right back to Adam’s rib for inspiration. The result was one of Gabriel’s most personal albums. It met with less success than So had done, reaching #2 in the album chart on both sides of the Atlantic, and making modest chart impact with the singles “Digging in the Dirt” and the funkier “Steam” which evoked memories of “Sledgehammer”. Gabriel followed the release of the album with a world tour (with Paula Cole filling O’Connor’s vocal role) and accompanying double CD and DVD Secret World Live in 1994.

Peter Gabriel employed an innovative approach in the marketing of the “US” album. Not wishing to feature only images of himself, he asked artist filmmakers Nichola Bruce and Michael Coulson to coordinate a marketing campaign using contemporary artists. Artists such as Helen Chadwick, Rebecca Horn, Nils-Udo, Andy Goldsworthy, David Mach and Yayoi Kusama, collaborated to create original artworks for each of the 11 songs on the multi-million-selling CD. Coulson and Bruce documented the process on Hi-8 video. Bruce left Real World and Coulson continued with the campaign, using the documentary background material as the basis for a promotional EPK, the long-form video All About Us and the interactive CD-ROM Xplora1.

Gabriel won three more Grammy Awards, all in the genre of Music Videos. He won the Best Music Video – Short Form Grammy in 1992 and 1993 for the videos to “Digging in the Dirt” and “Steam” respectively. Gabriel also won the 1995 Grammy for Best Music Video – Long Form for his Secret World Live video.

Later albums (1995-present)

After five years of not releasing any new music, Gabriel re-emerged with OVO, a soundtrack for the live Millennium Dome Show in London in 2000, and Long Walk Home, the music from the Australian movie Rabbit-Proof Fence, early in 2002. This soundtrack also received a Golden Globe nomination for Best Original Score – Motion Picture.

In September 2002, Gabriel released Up, his first full-length studio album in a decade. Entirely self-produced, Up returned to some of the themes of his work in the late ’70s and early ’80s. Three singles failed to make an impression on the charts — in part because almost every track exceeded six minutes in length, with multiple sections — but the album sold well globally, as Gabriel continued to draw from a loyal fan base from his almost forty years in the music business. Up was followed by a world tour featuring his daughter Melanie Gabriel on backing vocals, and two concert DVDs, Growing Up Live (2003) and Still Growing Up: Live and Unwrapped (2004).

In 2008, Gabriel contributed to the WALL-E soundtrack with several new songs with Thomas Newman, including “Down to Earth”, for which they received a Golden Globe nominations and Grammy Academy Award wins for Best Original Song from a Motion Picture.

Since the end of the Still Growing Up tour Peter has sporadically talked about working on new material for the next album, tentatively titled I/O, but as yet there has been no solid news. However, as of November 2008, Gabriel has spoken of recording and releasing a covers album entitled Scratch My Back, whereby he will record a cover of an artist’s song if that artist then reciprocates by recording one of his. It appears that this latter project may see the light of day before the I/O one; although work still continues on this.

Musicians & collaborators

Gabriel has worked with a relatively stable crew of musicians and recording engineers throughout his solo career. Bass and Stick player Tony Levin, for example, has appeared on every Peter Gabriel studio album (although not the soundtracks Passion and Long Walk Home) and has performed on every Gabriel solo tour. Guitar player David Rhodes has been Gabriel’s guitarist of choice since 1979. Prior to So, Jerry Marotta was Gabriel’s preferred drummer, both in the studio and on the road. (For the So and Us albums and tours Marotta was replaced by Manu Katché, who was then replaced by Ged Lynch on parts of the Up album and all of the subsequent tour). Gabriel is known for choosing top-flight collaborators, from co-producers such as Ezrin, Fripp, Lillywhite, and Lanois to musicians such as L. Shankar, Trent Reznor, Youssou N’Dour, Larry Fast, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Sinéad O’Connor, Kate Bush, Paula Cole, John Giblin, Peter Hammill, Papa Wemba, Manu Katché, Bayete, and Stewart Copeland.

Over the years, Gabriel has collaborated with singer Kate Bush several times; Bush provided backing vocals for Gabriel’s “Games Without Frontiers” and “No Self Control” in 1980, and female lead vocal for “Don’t Give Up” (a Top 10 hit in the UK) in 1986, and Gabriel appeared on her television special. Their duet of Roy Harper’s “Another Day” was discussed for release as a single, but never appeared.

He also collaborated with Laurie Anderson on two versions of her composition “Excellent Birds” – one for her 1984 album Mister Heartbreak, and a slightly different version called “This is the Picture (Excellent Birds)”, which appeared on cassette and CD versions of So. In 1987, when presenting Gabriel with an award for his music videos, Anderson related an occasion in which a recording session had gone late into the night and Gabriel’s voice had begun to sound somewhat strange, almost dreamlike. It was discovered that he had fallen asleep in front of the microphone, but had continued to sing.

In 1998 Gabriel appeared on the soundtrack of Babe: Pig in the City, not as a composer, but as the singer of the song “That’ll Do,” written by Randy Newman. The song was nominated for an Academy Award, and Gabriel and Newman performed it at the following year’s Oscar telecast. Many who saw him on that broadcast didn’t recognize him, as his hair had greyed and thinned since his most recent tour several years earlier. He performed a similar soundtrack appearance for the 2004 film Shall We Dance?, singing a cover version of “The Book of Love” by The Magnetic Fields.

Gabriel has also appeared on Robbie Robertson’s self-titled album, singing on “Fallen Angel”; co-written two Tom Robinson singles; and appeared on Joni Mitchell’s 1988 album Chalk Mark in a Rainstorm, on the track “My Secret Place.”

Gabriel collaborated on tracks with electronic musician BT. The tracks were never released, as the computers they were contained on were stolen from BT’s home in California. He also sang the lyrics for Deep Forest on their theme song for the movie Strange Days. In addition, Gabriel has appeared on Angelique Kidjo’s 2007 album Djin Djin, singing on the song “Salala.”

Gabriel has recorded a cover of the Vampire Weekend single “Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa” with Hot Chip.

WOMAD & other projects
Peter Gabriel 2008

Gabriel has been interested in world music for many years, with the first musical evidence appearing on his third album. This influence has increased over time, and he is the driving force behind the WOMAD (World of Music, Arts and Dance) movement. He created the Real World Studios and record label to facilitate the creation and distribution of such music by various artists, and he has worked to educate Western culture about the work of such musicians as Yungchen Lhamo, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and Youssou N’dour. He has a long-standing interest in human rights, and launched WITNESS, a nonprofit which trains human rights activists to use video and online technologies to expose human rights abuses. In 2006 his work with WITNESS and his long standing support of peace and human rights causes was recognised by the Nobel Peace Prize Laureates with the Man of Peace award.

In the 1990s, with Steve Nelson of Brilliant Media and director Michael Coulson, he developed advanced multimedia CD-ROM-based entertainment projects, creating the acclaimed Xplora (the world’s largest selling music CD-ROM), and subsequently the EVE CD-ROM. EVE was a music and art adventure game directed by Michael Coulson and co-produced by the Starwave Corporation in Seattle; it won the prestigious Milia d’Or award Grand Prize at the Cannes in 1996 and featured themes and interactivity well in advance of its time. Xplora and EVE can no longer be played on modern PCs, due to changes to their operating systems.

In 1994, Gabriel starred in the Breck Eisner short film “Recon” as a detective who enters the minds of murder victims to find their killer’s identity.

Gabriel helped pioneer a new realm of musical interaction in 2001, visiting Georgia State University’s Language Research Center to participate in keyboard jam sessions with bonobo apes from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. (This experience inspired the song “Animal Nation,” which was performed on Gabriel’s 2002 “Growing Up” tour and was featured on the Growing Up Live DVD.) Gabriel’s desire to bring attention to the intelligence of primates also took the form of ApeNet, a project that aimed to link great apes through the internet, enabling the first interspecies internet communication.

He was one of the founders of On Demand Distribution (OD2), one of the first online music download services. Its technology is used by MSN Music UK and others, and has become the dominant music download technology platform for stores in Europe. OD2 was bought by US company Loudeye in June 2004 and subsequently by Finnish mobile giant Nokia in October 2006 for $60 million.

Additionally, Gabriel is also co-founder (with Brian Eno) of a musicians union called Mudda, short for “magnificent union of digitally downloading artists.”

During the latter part of 2004, Gabriel spent time in a village in eastern Nepal with musician Ram Sharan Nepali, learning esoteric vocal techniques. Gabriel subsequently invited Nepali to attend and perform at the Womad festival in Adelaide, Australia.

In June 2005, Gabriel and broadcast industry entrepreneur David Engelke purchased Solid State Logic, a leading manufacturer of mixing consoles and digital audio workstations. SSL is among the top 2 or 3 recording console manufacturers in the world of recording.

Humanitarian initiatives

In 1992 Peter Gabriel co-founded WITNESS; a non-profit group that equips, trains and supports locally-based organizations worldwide to use video and the internet in human rights documentation and advocacy.

In 1995 he was one of the two winners of the North-South Prize in its inaugural year.
Peter Gabriel at WITNESS Gala 2007.

In the late 1990s, Gabriel and entrepreneur Richard Branson discussed with Nelson Mandela their idea of a small, dedicated group of leaders, working objectively and without any vested personal interest to solve difficult global conflicts.

On 18 July 2007, in Johannesburg, South Africa, Nelson Mandela announced the formation of a new group, Global Elders, in a speech he delivered on the occasion of his 89th birthday. The founding members of this group are Desmond Tutu, Graça Machel, Kofi Annan, Ela Bhatt, Gro Harlem Brundtland, Jimmy Carter, Li Zhaoxing, Mary Robinson, and Muhammad Yunus.

The Elders will be independently funded by a group of “Founders”, including Branson and Gabriel.

Desmond Tutu serves as the chair of The Elders, who will use their collective skills to catalyze peaceful resolutions to long-standing conflicts, articulate new approaches to global issues that are causing or may later cause immense human suffering, and share wisdom by helping to connect voices all over the world. They will work together over the next several months to consider carefully which specific issues they will confront.

In November 2007 Peter Gabriel launched The Hub http://hub.witness.org/

a ‘YouTube’ for human rights.

In September 2008 Peter Gabriel was named as the recipient of Amnesty International’s 2008 Ambassador of Conscience Award. In the same month, he received Quadriga United we Care award of Werkstatt Deutschland along with Boris Tadic’, Eckart Höfling and Wikipedia. The award was presented to him by Queen Silvia of Sweden.

Soundtracks

Gabriel is responsible for creating the entire musical score for three feature films:

* Birdy (1984) by Alan Parker — released as Birdy: Music from the Film by Peter Gabriel
* The Last Temptation of Christ (1988) by Martin Scorsese — released as Passion: Music for The Last Temptation of Christ, with additional material on Passion – Sources
* Rabbit-Proof Fence (2002) by Phillip Noyce — released as Long Walk Home: Music from the Rabbit-Proof Fence

Films to which Gabriel has contributed music tracks or his voice include:

* Against All Odds (1984) — song “Walk Through the Fire”
* Angel Baby (1995) — song “We Do What We’re Told”
* Babe: Pig in the City (1998) — song “That’ll Do”
* Barnyard (2006) — song “Father, Son”
* The Battle of Shaker Heights (2003) — song “When You’re Falling” with Afro Celt Sound System
* The Bone Collector (1999) — songs “Don’t Give Up” and “Zaar”
* The Chocolate War (1988) — songs “We Do What We’re Told” and “I Have the Touch”
* City of Angels (1998) — song “I Grieve”, pre-Up version
* Gangs of New York (2002) — instrumental version of “Signal to Noise”
* Gremlins (1984) — song “Out, Out”
* Hard to Hold (1984) — song “I Go Swimming”
* In Good Company (2004) — song “Solsbury Hill”
* Jungle 2 Jungle (1997) — song “Shaking the Tree ’97 (Jungle Version)”
* Phenomenon (1996) — song “I Have the Touch”, remixed with additional lyrics
* Philadelphia (1993) — song “Lovetown”
* Natural Born Killers (1994) — song “Taboo”, with Nusrat Fateh Ali Kahn
* Project X (1987) — song “Shock the Monkey”
* Red Planet (2000) — song “The Tower that Ate People”, remixed
* Say Anything… (1989) — song “In Your Eyes”
* Shall We Dance? (2004) — song “The Book of Love”, originally performed by The Magnetic Fields
* Strange Days (1995) — song “While the Earth Sleeps” with Deep Forest
* Until the End of the World (1991) — song “Blood of Eden”, pre-album version without Sinéad O’Connor’s backing vocals
* Vanilla Sky (2001) — song “Solsbury Hill”
* Virtuosity (1995) — song “Partyman”, co-written with Tori Amos
* Waking the Dead (2000) — song “Mercy Street”
* WALL-E (2008) — song “Down to Earth”. Gabriel has received an Oscar nomination for Best Song at the 81st Academy Awards for his work on the Pixar feature film.
* The Wild Thornberrys Movie (2002) — songs “Animal Nation” and “Shaking the Tree (’02 Remix)”

Personal life

Peter Gabriel has two daughters — Anna-Marie (born 26 July 1974) and Melanie (born 23 August 1976) — with his first wife Jill Moore. They were married on 17 March 1971 and divorced in 1987. Anna-Marie is a filmmaker; Melanie is a musician. Anna-Marie filmed a documentary — Growing Up On Tour: A Family Portrait — during Gabriel’s 2002 “Growing Up” tour, whilst Melanie was a vocalist — she also sang on Gabriel’s 2007 “Warm Up” tour. In the late ’80s and early ’90s Gabriel lived with actress Rosanna Arquette but they never married. Gabriel also has two sons — Isaac (born 2001) and Luc (born 5 July 2008) — with his wife Meabh Flynn. They have been married since 9 June 2002.

Recent work & appearances

* He coordinated and performed at the Eden Project Live 8 concert in July 2005.
* Gabriel played on stage with Yusuf Islam (formerly Cat Stevens), 33 years after having played on Stevens’ Mona Bone Jakon album, in Johannesburg during Nelson Mandela’s 46664 concert. The two performed the Stevens hit “Wild World”.
* A double DVD set, Peter Gabriel Live & Unwrapped, was released in October, 2005.
* A future DVD release will be the concert film PoV, previously available on VHS. It is getting the full 5.1 remix treatment in Gabriel’s Realworld studios.
* FIFA asked Gabriel and Brian Eno to organise an opening ceremony for the 2006 FIFA World Cup finals in Germany, planned to take place a couple of days before the start of the tournament. Gabriel had recently become a fan of the game and 2005 champions league winners Liverpool, and worked on songs for the show in Berlin’s Olympic Stadium. Although the show was cancelled in January 2006 by FIFA due to going over budget and supposed lack of interest, the official explanation was potential damage to the pitch.
* Rumours of a possible reunion of the original Genesis line-up began circulating in 2004 after Phil Collins stated in an interview that he is open to the idea of sitting back behind the drums and “let Peter be the singer.” The classic line-up has only reformed for a live performance once before, in 1982. However, the group did work together to create a new version of the 1974 song “The Carpet Crawlers”, ultimately released on the Genesis Hits record as “The Carpet Crawlers 1999.” Gabriel later met with other Genesis band members, and a possible reunion tour of The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway was discussed. Gabriel declined a reunion, so Collins, Banks, and Rutherford chose to tour as Genesis without him.
* Gabriel performed John Lennon’s “Imagine” at the opening ceremonies of the Winter Olympics in Torino, Italy on 10 February 2006.
* Cingular Wireless has aired commercials featuring Gabriel’s “Solsbury Hill.”
* Gabriel is recording a new studio album entitled Input/Output, which will be his first new album release since Up in 2002. No release date has been announced.
* Gabriel’s song “Digging in the Dirt” is now being used for promotional videos for the FX show “Dirt”
* Gabriel is involved in The Filter, an add-on application for iTunes, Windows Media Player and some Nokia phones which can automatically generate playlists based on music you select.
* In November 2006, the Seventh World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates in Rome presented Gabriel with the Man of Peace award. The award, presented by former President of the USSR and Nobel Peace Prize winner Mikhail Gorbachev and Walter Veltroni, Mayor of Rome, was an acknowledgement of Gabriel’s extensive contribution and work on behalf of human rights and peace. The award was presented in the Giulio Cesare Hall of the Campidoglio in Rome.
* Also at the end of 2006 Peter was awarded the Q Magazine Lifetime Achievement Award.
* Gabriel’s most recent project is with the BBC World Service’s competition “The Next Big Thing” to find the world’s best young band. Gabriel is judging the final six young artists with William Orbit, Geoff Travis and Angelique Kidjo.
* First reported in The Times newspaper on 21 January 2007, Peter Gabriel has announced that he will release his next album in the U.S. without the aid of a record company. Gabriel, an early pioneer of digital music distribution, has raised £2 million towards recording and ‘shipping’ his next as-yet-untitled album in a venture with investment boutique Ingenious Media. Gabriel is expected to earn double the money that he would through a conventional record deal. Commercial director Duncan Reid of Ingenious explains the business savvy of the deal, saying, “If you’re paying a small distribution fee and covering your own marketing costs, you enjoy the lion’s share of the proceeds of the album. Gabriel is expected to outsource CD production for worldwide release through Warner Bros. Records. The new album deal covers the North America territory, where Gabriel is currently out of contract.
* Gabriel’s new album, Big Blue Ball, will be launched in America thanks to a venture capital trust initiative. Bosses at London-based firm Ingenious have raised more than $4 million (GBP 2 million) to help promote his latest release in the US. The venture capitalists, Gabriel and his Real World Limited partners, have created a new joint venture company, High Level Recordings Limited, to oversee the release of the new album in April 2008.Gabriel will also appear on a nationwide tour for the album in 2009.
* On 24 May 2007, he was honoured with the Ivor Novello Award for lifetime achievement.
* Gabriel invested in online advertising-supported free music download site, We7.com.

Other info

* In 1976, Gabriel covered the Beatles song “Strawberry Fields Forever” for the musical documentary All This and World War II. He has also recorded covers of Leonard Cohen’s “Suzanne,” the Gershwin standard “Summertime,” the Magnetic Fields’ “Book of Love,” The Four Tops’ “I’ll Be There,” and Joseph Arthur’s “In the Sun.” A cover of Marvin Gaye’s “Ain’t That Peculiar”, part of his set list for his first solo tour, is available on some bootlegs but was never commercially released.
* The 2003 videos Uru: Ages Beyond Myst from game companies Cyan Worlds and Ubisoft featured the song “Burn You Up, Burn You Down”.
* The 2004 release of Myst IV: Revelation featured “Curtains”, originally a B-side from the single “Big Time” from So. The song, slightly remixed from its original version, is also known as “Portal to Dreamworld”. Gabriel also performs a voice acting part in the game.
* He is mentioned in two Vampire Weekend songs: Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa and Ottoman. He has responded by covering Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa backed by Hot Chip.
* Between 4 and 5 May 2008 the servers housing www.petergabriel.com were stolen from the data centre of the ISP that was hosting them at the time.
* In 1982 Peter Gabriel reunited with his former Genesis colleagues for the one-off concert, Six of the Best.
* In 2001, Boston radio station 92.5 The River used a computer program to generate the artist to whom all their listeners will listen. The artist was Peter Gabriel. Since 2001, Gabriel’s greatest hits are required to get played every two hours, causing some to call the station “Gabriel FM”.

Discography

Main article: Peter Gabriel discography

See also

* List of best selling music artists
* List of number-one hits (United States)
* List of artists who reached number one on the Hot 100 (U.S.)
* List of number-one dance hits (United States)
* List of artists who reached number one on the U.S. Dance chart
* List of artists who reached number one on the U.S. Mainstream Rock chart
* List of autobiographical songs (“Solsbury Hill”)
* Solid State Logic

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